The present invention relates to the area of explosive materials, and specifically to the desensitization and disposal of such explosives.
It has long been a practice to destroy explosive materials and propellants determined to be either obsolete or deteriorated by open incineration or burning. With the enactment of the pollution abatement legislation, the practice of open burning of propellants and explosives had to be replaced by controlled incineration so that ambient air standards could be met. Controlled incineration generally requires that the explosive material in question be placed in a slurry in water prior to being ground up and incinerated so that the materials would be safer to handle. The concentration of explosive material that could be placed in such a slurry, however, was restricted to an amount approximately equal to that required to barely sustain combustion in order to minimize the hazard of burning excessive quantities. Such restriction on concentration increases the cost of incineration, as the time for processing a given quantity of explosive is increased and the fuel required to incinerate that explosive is likewise greater.
In particular, the explosives and propellants known as TNT, RDX, HMX, nitroglycerin, nitroguanidine, and nitrocellulose comprise a group of organic compounds sharing in common the elements of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen, which, upon combustion, form the oxides of carbon and nitrogen in addition to water. All of the above compounds, since they contain the same elements, tend to form the same combustion products, and have similar functional groups which are the bases for their energetic properties.
It is known to employ sodium sulfide as a reductant for desensitizing explosives and/or propellants. However, the particular reductant, Na.sub.2 S, is undesirable in an incineration or water treatment process as it introduces new elements, and new pollutants, into the system. Thus, while complete deactivation is achieved, increased pollution likewise occurs. Accordingly, the need has arisen for reductants which achieve the desired desensitization of the energetic materials without increasing the variety of pollution caused by the incineration process and without the introduction of any difficulties in the removal of the reductant after deactivation is achieved.